Ryan nodded. “Yeah.”
He positioned the four-and-a-half-inch barrel within a couple of inches of the lock, turned his head away and squeezed the trigger three times.
There was an eruption of orange sparks, and the high-powered rounds shattered the fastening on the morgue’s door, the shock of the triple explosion jolting clear up his arm to the shoulder. Ryan holstered the blaster and reached out, turning the handle, pushing the door open.
Cold air rushed into the passage, like white spray, all of them feeling the biting chill.
“Doc!” Mildred called, her voice ragged with the first edge of panic, pushing past Ryan, running into the disinfected, freezing room.
“Here.” The voice in reply came whispering from the deep shadows at the very rear of the mortuary, near the rows of deep cabinets.
Doc was sitting, arms huddled around himself, ice frosted in his hair, his face as white as polished ivory. Only his pale blue eyes showed any sign of life.
Mildred knelt at his side, finger going to the angle of neck and shoulder, feeling for a pulse. “Very slow,” she said urgently. “Got to move him and warm him up.”
Ryan and J.B. bent down, locking their hands beneath the old man’s thighs, steadying him as they lifted. Doc’s head lolled to the right, his eyes closing.
“What about the hot water in the showers?” Krysty suggested. “Raise his temperature.”
“Yeah. Make a bed ready for him with plenty of blankets. Get him stripped off.”
Now that the first shock of finding Doc so close to his unexpected date with the Grim Reaper had passed, Mildred had assumed her calm, professional demeanor.
DOCS BODY FELT FROZEN, the skin like parchment. The flesh was white, blotted with patches of blue and a deeper purple. Veins stood out on the back of his hands like dark whipcord. The frost melted away once they got him out of the freezing mortuary into the rest of the complex.
“Strip him off,” Mildred ordered. “One of you should…maybe both of you should get in the shower with him to support him. Jak, you and Dean and Krysty get the bed ready for him.” Ryan and J.B. carefully laid the motionless body on the tiled floor, peeling quickly out of their clothes, modestly keeping on their underwears, while Mildred had turned the chrome faucets, releasing a steady stream of warm water.
“Don’t have it too hot for starters,” Ryan said. “Shock could kill him.”
“Why don’t you go teach your grandma to suck eggs,” Mildred snapped.
Ryan didn’t respond to the gibe, taking one arm and lifting, while the Armorer took the other side. They eased Doc into a sitting position under the shower, kneeling alongside to hold him steady.
“He could mebbe take it just a little hotter,” J.B. suggested.
Mildred adjusted the thermostat control. “How about that, John?”
“Better.”
The water was now hot enough to steam, condensation streaming down the white tiles. All three men were soaked, huddled close together.
“How’s he doing?” Mildred asked, peering through the fog. “How’s the pulse?”
Ryan checked it at Doc’s right wrist, closing his good eye to keep out the torrent of hot water. “Still a tad slow. But not far off normal.”
“Maybe we should get him straight into a bed,” Mildred said thoughtfully.
Doc’s eyes blinked open and he gazed around, his expression blankly puzzled as he took in Ryan and J.B. on either side of him on the floor of the shower. Then he became aware of his own nakedness. Finally he turned his head and saw Mildred staring down at him.
“By the…” he began, coughing as water gushed into his open mouth.
“Shut it, Doc,” Mildred hissed. “Not the time for your humor.”
“Where…? I was freezing in a desperately cold place. What…?” His fine set of perfect teeth were chattering like someone with an ague.
“Get him up and out of there, guys.” Mildred had found an armful of large white towels, made from a thick, fluffy material, in a closet. The water was turned off, the last drops streaming down the sluice, vanishing through the chromed drain cover. Ryan and J.B. helped Doc out, almost carrying him between them along the short stretch of corridor to the dormitory.